The new cultivar is a product of a planned breeding program. The new variety was discovered as a naturally occurring whole plant mutation. The instant plant was found as a single plant from a planting of more than 1000 plants of ‘Abutilon red’ by Lucilene Anatriello in February 2004 in São José do Rio Preto, Brazil.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar ‘ATN RT5’ by vegetative cuttings was performed in São José do Rio Preto, Brazil and has shown that the unique features of this cultivar are stable and reproduced true to type it successive generations.